Wasteland Tales
by JumpinBeans
Summary: A compilation of short stories and tales of the world that take place in the world of Fallout.
1. Hunter and Mole Rat

_**The Hunter and the Mole Rat**_

Mole Rat

Deep in the sewers of the Capital Wasteland, a mole rat skittered through the sewer's dark and rusty corridors. It sniffed the air as it passed by an opening, recognizing the smell of food. The mole rat decided to travel down this tunnel, for even the smell of food in this dark future gave hope to the simplest of creatures. This mole rat was one of those creatures that believed in hope. Its understanding of this feeling was a bit frightening, since it did not know what the feeling meant, but it's instincts took over again and the feeling faded. Lost in the DNA of a creature almost completely changed by radiation.

As it traveled down farther into this certain tunnel it finally saw its goal. A hunk of flesh was laying in an old office chair. It saw the meat and headed straight for it, to busy to notice the tripwire straight in front of it. The tripwire snapped, the twanging of the string set off a loud gunshot. A shotgun had been attached to the tripwire, laying in wait for some poor creature to pass by. The one flaw of the trap? It was that the hunter had placed it far to high to kill the mole rat, and it was only injured.

The mole rat limped away with its prize in mouth, deciding that it would be best to get back to the nest before the hunter cam to check his trap.

* * *

Hunter

The hunter had heard the trap setting off, as he was already on his way to check them. The hunter was a Ghoul, a human mutilated by radiation into a a zombiesque (sometimes sentient) life-form, who wore clothes he had found on one of his victims. It was nice armor, didn't protect very much, but it was aesthetically pleasing to him. He ran to the trap and checked around. Nothing. Whatever had set off the trap was getting away, and still moving pretty fast.

The Ghoul followed drops of blood that had fell from the mole rat's minor injury. It lead deeper into the sewer then he cared to go, but food was food and the hunter was hungry. _I shouldn't have used all of my last catch for bait. Stupid Stupid me... _As he went deeper into the sewer the stench of decay became more powerful. Soon it smelled almost as bad as the Ghoul itself, but if he could smell it he took no notice. His goal was close, and soon he would be eating mole rat.

* * *

Mole Rat

The mole rat lay in its nest. Soon his partner would be back and she would feed the pups. These pups were a little weirder then normal mole rats, they had longer legs and sharper teeth. This didn't concern the mole rat though, most of their species were mutated in some way or another. The chunk of meat was a little less then half-eaten and it lay next to the sleeping pups. The mole rat's partner would be able to feed it to them, they could wait.

Footsteps echoed throughout the sewers. The mole rat heard them and stopped nursing its wounds to look out at the corridor. It saw a shadow appear, slowly getting closer until the hunter cam into view. The mole rat sprang at the Ghoul and bit it in the arm. The Ghoul swore in anger and punched at the mole rat. No matter how hard he punched, the mole rat wouldn't let go. Another squeak came from the tunnels, it was the mole rat's partner. The 2nd mole rat jumped at the ghoul and knocked it down, making it a much easier target. After a while, the Ghoul succumbed to his death. The hunter was now the meal for his former prey.


	2. Rebuild

**Rebuild**

There was no where to turn, no where to run. It was all just a blur, the explosions, the people dying the burning hot air on my skin. I tried to hide, I really truly did. When the bombs started falling I jumped into the first preservation chamber I saw and shut the door behind me, but it wasn't enough. There wasn't enough time, the radiation was already slowly killing me, I thought I was a goner. Totally and completely dead, but I was still alive. Just not human, not zombie, something in between. I am a Ghoul.

Before the bombs, the fighting, the dying, the mutations, and this whole hell that was created I was a banker. Just an average run-of-the-mill guy, went home to my wife and kids and gave them a big smile. They couldn't have survived, and living like this isn't surviving. The war took away my soul, it took my heart. I let myself become part of this new wasteland, this new country. Dying would be preferable to living like this, but I can't let myself die. Not yet. I have one mission, and one mission only. To bring this place under control, under management.

When I left the preservation chamber for the first time I couldn't feel anything. I watched in horror as my skin bubbled and turned awkward colors, flesh and bone poking through the mutated skin. I screamed at the top of my lungs to find my voice was mutilated into something different. My clothes were tattered and destroyed, the city was in rubble and ruin. Fire everywhere, corpses piled in the streets. I saw others like me, but they didn't last long. Their spirit couldn't take it like this, they had taken their life to escape being what I let myself become.

I ended up finally back to my house, I cried as I looked at it. My house, my perfect house. The one thing other than my wife and children I spent so much time with was now a jumble of burnt timber and melted glass. I started searching through the rubble and it took me hours to finally find what I was looking for. One thing survived, and it was a family portrait. The paper completely intact. I folded it up and put in my tattered pants pocket, making sure that I didn't lose it.

About 200 years later and look at me, I live in some old sewer system completing contracts that got me caps. Anything that I got caps from, made me happy. I was saving up and rebuilding my house, and once I was done rebuilding my house...I would start to rebuild my life, and that is my mission. To rebuild, and live. To survive, even as a grotesque being such as myself. No matter how ugly a person is on the outside, they still have feelings. I'm not jsut some zombie.


	3. Dahlia's Song

**Dahlia's Song**

The Empire State Building. A building of true American achievement, and one of the best representations of American culture. It was also one of the biggest catastrophes in the world after the bombs fell. No one survived it's collapse, no one at all.

780 people had taken residence in the building 150 years after the bombs fell, and they spent their time fixing the place up and adding on to the existing structure. A lot of the people proclaimed it as a utopia, filled with gardens, friendly souls, and a strange but comforting aura around it. Piano music whipped around and floated down to the lower levels. It was played by a woman named Dahlia.

Dahlia was though to be the smartest and probably one of the most beautiful women of the Empire State building. She played the piano for an hour a day, and during that hour all quarrels stopped immediately and even travelers stopped momentarily to listen to her sweet music. Dahlia's blond hair was coveted by many other women, and they often tried to be like her, to look like her, to be as amazing as her. Unfortunately the piano was the cause of the tower's actual structural failure.

After one hundred and fity years of structural decay and quick fixes. The building could no longer hold the strain. It creaked and groaned, but the people ignored it, taking it as a sign to just repair it a little more. The real problem came the night of Dahlia's first actual concert. She had always dreamed of a concert but she had never actually had the nerve to create a a piece a music of her own. This however changed one day.

She sat in silence on the top floor, glancing down at the destruction below. Fires still raged inside the burnt and decayed city. Raiders fought for control and were ferocious as ever. She needed a song that portrayed the broken city, she wanted to sing it as well. For she finally though that her sweet voice could bring a temporary piece to the Wasteland. This song was recorded at the concert, and after the tower's fall it was found and reproduced all across the wasteland. It was Dahlia's Song.

The night of the concert finally came, and most of the residents had taken shelter in the top two floors to listen to her, Dahlia began with a soft intro, then she started playing dark but beautiful tones. She began to sing.

_"Darkness wages in the air, bright and vibrant blood everywhere."_  
_"Scattered remains, and twisted remains. That's all that is left. Of this world."_  
_"The beauty we find today. Is here in our own human hearts."_  
_"The beauty is not led astray, we are all just human."_  
_"The world before is gone, together we can rebuild."_  
_"War is the same, and it seems so strange."_  
_"That it is something that will never change."_

_"The children want to eat. Their starving eyes do not show defeat."  
"There are Raiders and Mutants. Liars and Thieves."  
"People who hate life. They want no reprieve."  
"We will give them, their doom."  
"We will end them, and we shall survive."  
"We, always. Survive."_

Her last note hung in the air. The people clapped and cheered for an encore, but suddenly they heard something. The grinding of girders, the breaking of concrete. The piano fell through the floor, and Dahlia along with it. The Empire State Building swayed and topped in on itself. Kiling everyone and leaving no survivors. The only thing left of it, is Dahlia's Song.


	4. Moscow Cries

Due to the exposure of so much radiation, Russia ended up suffering a hellish nuclear winter. Survivors had to hide in subway tunnels or underground bunkers to survive. It's 200 years after the bombs fell and it's still that way. A young man is trekking across what used to be Moscow, he has on a suit of power armor that keeps his body warm. His name was Garney, and he was a Brotherhood of Steel soldier running a mission. His mission was to see if there was any type of civilization whatsoever. Or at least any survivors.

The myth was that he would have to look for a giant red smoke signal sent by his contact. The contact would then take him to the subway entrance, and then they would both descend into the frozen tunnels underneath Moscow. Garney looked in the sky, there was red smoke trailing off in the distance. He started heading towards it. This must have been his contact, Dmetri.

Dmetri was the descendant of a Russian family that had taken residents in one of the local vaults. They kept their heritage for generations and passed it on to him, the only reason he even remembers the location of Moscow is from a map his mother had given him. He made sure to keep it with him at all times.

Garney met Dmetri at the entrance of the tunnels his power armor making whirring sounds and running a diagnostic. "Hello Dmetri, how are you?" He asked the man covered in fur at the entrance. "I'm fine, yet my body is colder than killing a baby." Garney chuckled, that was the sense of humor he liked. Dark. The only good kind of humor in a world now so cold. "Shall we head in comrade? If not I can understand perfectly, and tell your mother hello. I already told her that last night." Dmetri smirked. Garney shook his head, "You and my mother Dmetri, I don't understand your obsession with corpses."  
"They don't make a sound, or fight back."  
"Just like your mute sister."  
"You are getting better at this friend." Dmetri chuckled, "But the time for jokes is over. Once we are inside I can not tell you what is inside there. The only way to find out whats down there is to go down there."

"Alright then, let's head inside." Garney said, and they headed into the dark tunnel. Into the guts of Moscow. Right away they noticed it was considerably warmer down in the tunnels, and the air wasn't as stale as on the surface. The rads were also significantly less lethal than they were on the surface. Dmetri and Garney both had to consistently take Rad-X and RadAway to keep their bodies healthy. If there was anyone left in Russia, there was no way they were human.

As they went farther down in the tunnels they started seeing more and more frozen bodies of people who didn't survive the nuclear winter. Some of them were hugging each other, others were sitting alone or laying alone by themselves. One man was pounding furiously on a big locked door before he was frozen in place.

"We should check this door, there might b goodies behind it," Dmetri said as he pulled down a gas mask across his face. Garney turned the strength modifier in his power suit on and punched at the door. It only partially opened the door so he kept going. Fist after fist, punch after punch and finally the door gave way. Gas steamed out of the passageway and the two men were blasted with a huge intake of hot air.

Inside was a corroded iron corridor, filled with green smoke. Charred skeletons lay all around the corridor, still filling the air with the smell of dead and burnt flesh. "These people had tried to escape while the others had tried to get in. What the hell is going on here Dmetri?"  
"I do not know, but we must keep moving forward. There is something big in here, something worthwhile. I can feel it."  
"It's either that or get caught in a blizzard."

"Good thinking friend. Now let's go," Dmetri led him down the iron corridor. There were more human remains as they kept traveling. They entered a big metal room covered in more of the green gas. The skeletons here were more docile than the other ones, hugging each other laying down looking at the ceiling with empty eye-sockets. Garney kept his composure and both of them continued on through the tunnel. "This is more than a metro station. It has to be. Corridors this long wouldn't be used just for maintenance," Garney said as they continued forward. "Exactly, it has to be some kind of military compound."  
"Why do you say that?"  
"The lettering on the walls. I can only make out some of the words but the words I can make out include phrases like top secret and no unauthorized personnel."  
"Do you think the security system still works?"  
Dmetri shook his head, "We can only pray that it died with the city."

After a short time they came upon another iron-wrought door. It was huge and had several complicated locks on it that seem to be controlled by a nearby terminal. Dmetri puled out a big white chunk of material with wires and a keypad on it "This is why I never leave home without a little bit of explosives to uncomplicated things. I'm setting this for 10 seconds. That gives us enough time to get out of the way." Dmetri put the explosives on the door, punched in a couple commands, and started sprinting down the hallway. Garney followed suit.

The explosion rocked the whole place, littering the floor with debris. Dmetri and Garney composed themselves and headed into the doorway. They saw what few have ever seen, a giant pulsating Tesla coil surrounded by balls of electricity. A giant vat sat underneath the coil filled with a greenish, brown liquid. Garney clapped his hands, "This will aid the Brotherhood immensely, let's see if we can find a terminal Dmetri."  
"Already on one and translating the data."  
"Ah, do you have any idea what this thing is?"  
"No but- wait one second. Something's come up."  
"What is it.?"  
"It says this can neutralize radioactivity with intense electromagnetic beams. This is a giant neutralizer. Itwould be worth a fortune."  
"Exactly why the Brotherhood wants to get its hands on it."  
"And the Enclave."  
"What about the Enclave?"  
"They'll be willing to pay a whole lot more than you to get this neutralizer. I think it's time I switched sides."  
"Dmetri. Don't do this."

Dmetri pulled another explosive charge from his bag and headed over towards Garney, "My friend you have two choices. One, let me have this and die. Or two, I blow us all the way back to the Great War." Garney smiled, ...and to never let technology fall into the hands of those willing to use it for malice." He grabbed the explosives from Dmetri and detonated them. The neutralizer would belong to the Brotherhood of Steel, or no one at all.


	5. Play Time

50 short years after the bombs fell. 3 children, who had turned into ghouls long ago, played in the radioactive waste lying around them. In the abandoned schoolhouse they were the only residents, playing with everything. Even the skeletons, which they had positioned at various desks and tables to make everything seem more realistic. The 3 of them had forgotten their names a long time ago, and referred to each other by names they've given themselves. The tallest boy was named Pencil, the short and stout ghoul boy was named Boom, and the small little ghoul girl was known as Peggy, in reference to the one pigtail still hanging onto her mutated scalp.

Peggy and Pencil were both playing on the wrecked merry-go-round when they heard Boom yell, "Hey guys check this out over here!" They ran towards him, and saw him standing beside the school house looking into the dense radioactive fog. "I saw shapes moving around out there. I swear it!" Pencil put on his glasses. He still needed them to help him see farther away. "I don't see anything Boom. I think you're just imagining things."  
"No way! There's something out there!"

Peggy screamed. Boom and Pencil turned to see what she saw. There was nothing there. "There was something there. I know it!" she shouted to them. Pencil snorted," The radiation is getting to your guys's heads. There isn't anything out there but rubble and radiation." Pencil started to walk back to the school when he to saw something. Dark shapes in the fog, shapes that were coming closer and closer. When they became close enough for him to see Pencil screamed. "Monsters!" Peggy and Boom stood no chance. They were already upon them, only Pencil could escape into the dark hallways of the school.

He ran into the janitors closet, where they kept their spears for hunting mole rats. In the very back was a lockbox, inside was a 10mm pistol Pencil had found one day. He had been saving it for such a day, when he might be threatened. Pencil left the closet and looked around waiting for the dark shadowy figures to come. Yet none did, all he could do was wait for them to attack him. Nothing came. Pencil went outside and found Peggy and Boom dead, their bodies mutilated. He was the only one left, and he knew he would have to leave the school. Pencil walked into the dense radioactive fog, and out into a world that had once been friendly to him.


	6. Brandon on the Battlefield

"Breathe son. Breathe," someone was talking to him. Daniel heard him and tried to remember what had just happened. His squad had just been ambushed by Legion, and the first thing they had done was frag the hell out of the. Daniel shook off the shell-shock and grabbed at his helmet. Blood was trickling down from a cut on his head, it was wet, hot, and sticky. He grabbed his service rifle and took cover behind the husk of an old car.

"There are some legionnaires holed up on the other side of the highway. They got rifles, automatic ones. Nothing like the shit rifles we get," Brandon said. He was lower than Daniel on the food chain, but he liked to keep it that way. He was a 20 year veteran of the NCR and all of the promotions they'd tried to give him were shot down. He preferred grunt work, he thought it was much more fun. "Alright. We lost anyone?"  
"Rob and Koop. Sheila, Garrett, and Raz are back behind us. The fucking Legion's got Wanda."  
"Shit. Do we know how many?"  
"At least seven. Judging by their aim they're veteran's too."

"Just our fucking luck," as Daniel said this bullets pinged around him. He felt one pass by his shoulder, and hit one of the empty barrels behind him. "We need to do something, and fast. Or we're going to get our asses kicked."  
"Well. I've got a plan, of sorts."  
"What?"  
"Why not just go in guns blazing?"  
"So you want to write your own obituary?  
"No no. Listen to me. If you go right, and I go left then Sheila, Garrett, and Raz can give us cover fire. It's really either that or be picked off one by one."  
"I hate to say it, but you're right. How do we let Sheila and the others know?"  
"Trust me, they'll know."

Brandon jumped out of cover and sprinted over to half of a ripped apart bus. He reached cover and started firing, hitting one of the legionnaires in the head. Daniel ran to his right, and two more of the legionnaires ended up with lead in their brains. Daniel kept running and dove for cover and landed behind a concrete barricade. He started firing rapidly, hitting one of them in the arm and another in the leg. Brandon started running again, moving in even closer to the legionnaires. They kept firing at him, but the bullets just seemed to pass right by him. He ran with an almost inhuman speed, smashing the butt of his rifle into one of the Legion's soldiers before blasting three rounds into another. Brandon threw down his weapon and pulled out his combat knife, fighting off two of them armed with machetes.

Daniel ran up to help him, as did Sheila, Garrett, and Raz, but it was to late to save Brandon. One of the legionnaires lying on the ground pulled a 357 revolver from his hip and shot the old man. Daniel and the others fired on the Legion troops, gunning the down while they were distracted. Once all the legionnaires were dead, Daniel walked over to Brandon's corpse. "Dying on the battlefield' guess it's better than old age." He closed the dead man's eyes and took his dog tags. " I won't forget this Brandon, not ever."

They found Wanda in a nearby shed, one of the legionnaires had raped her and was in the process of doing it again when Daniel burst in and shot him in the back. He grabbed Wanda's fatigues and handed them to her before walking out. They were going to have to report back to McCarran, but not before burying their friends. They didn't bother with the Legion, the crows would take care of them.


	7. PintSized Asher

Out of the many vaults that inhabit the nuclear wasteland that once was the United States, many more "private" vaults were also created. Vaults not known to the public. One of these vaults specifically kept some of the most dangerous and aggressive criminals in the US. It was known to its inhabitants as Vault 140 They were testing a different strand of FEV (Forced Evolutionary Virus). A strand that was built to find docile and make the recipients calmer, simpler, and more easily manipulated. 150 years of research and testing got the scientists nowhere, but the convict's descendants kept the traits that their parents and grandparents had. They rebelled against the scientists in the vault and took it over. They opened the giant door that led to the wasteland, and the first thing that hit them was the cold. The bone-chilling cold.

Vault 140 was located in what used to be Quebec, Canada. The city surrounding it was dead, and frozen. The people of Vault 140 realized that it would be almost impossible to escape to warmth without being frozen first. There was no protective gear in the vaults, no way for them to keep the cold out. They would have to stay in the vault, until they figured out how to escape. 20 years past and many of he people attempted to leave, all never returning and presumed dead. The vault continued on with its life until one strange day. The day where a visitor arrived.

The visitor was not a human, not one of the people in the vaults. He was a ghoul, a person so irradiated their bodies are corpse-like in quality. He told the vault-dwellers his story, of how he was looking for a descendant of his bloodline. His brother's descendant. The ghoul's name was Kennedy, and his brother was a cold-blooded serial killer. Kennedy told them he needed the youngest child of his brother's bloodline for a special task. A task he refused to tell them of.

The vault-dwellers brought the youngest child in Kennedy's bloodline forward. His name was Asher, and Kennedy smiled as he tousled his hair. He asked only of one thing from the vault-dwellers, a minute alone to explain to his great grand-nephew his purpose. The vault-dwellers left the two alone and Kennedy rasped into his ear, "Your great grandfather was special. He had something inside of him that no one else did."  
"What?" said Asher.  
"His best work was as a child, and the government before the war secretly found him out. Oh, it was hard for them but they found him and brought him here.:  
"What did he do?"  
"He made sure to satisfy a hunger that he kept inside himself for so long."  
"Sometimes..I feel like I'm missing something. Like a part of me is wrong, and I need to fix it."

"Then it is good I brought you this," Kennedy pulled out a brown package from his backpack and handed it to Asher. "This is yours now. It is your duty to feed your hunger. My brother wanted me to pass this on and now that I have its time for me to get out of here and make my own life." Kennedy moved towards the control panel and opened the vault's door. The huge gate crashed aside and Kennedy exited the vault, but not before winking at Asher.

The other vault residents came in and found that Kennedy was gone. Asher hid the package as he told them all the ghoul was just a freak. Wanting nothing more than to have his way with the young boy. Asher said he declined and the residents sighed. They all went back to the humdrum ways of vault life, all except Asher. He went back to his room and opened the brown package, and inside was a mask. A clown mask, and a knife. There was also a note. _You are my blood, so spread as much as you can of others. You are now the Pint-Sized Slasher, no one else._ Asher grinned as his smile reached ear to ear, he wouldn't be hungry for much longer.


	8. Senator's Journal Excerps

{These are excerpts of a journal, the journal is not completely there. It has been torn and destroyed over the years, but some small bits were recovered}

_...arrived yesterday. These damn Commies are really starting to bug me. First they check all of our clothing, then they strip search me. They even had the nerve to pat down my wife. I came to talk politics, not be molested..._

_...My wife's becoming increasingly paranoid, she keeps thinking that everyone at the embassy is watching her. Damn fool is what she is, all we need to do is see the ambassador and they just won't let us in. I've pleaded with the guards, they keep telling us that the ambassador's busy. What a ridiculous notion, we've been here for 3 days already. I might not make it back to the Senate in the next week..._

_...Just got off the phone with the President, phone started getting mumbled and filled with static. I could only make out don't trust. Don't trust who? Don't trust the ambassador? My wife? The guards? Who shouldn't I trust? This is getting ridiculous, why can't we just go home?..._

_...I swear that there was someone in our room while we were sleeping. My wife was just staring at the mirror and something black rustled in the corner before it dashed out the door and down the hallway. I tried to follow it, but I'm not the man I used to be and quickly I quickly tired out. I didn't want to go back to sleep. I just need to be wary and cautious. We may be in the great United States of America, but we're also negotiating with the damned Chinese..._

_...My wife is dead. She had been staring at the mirror for some time, and when I tried to talk to her she didn't respond. I checked the sheets and found someone had pierced through her chest with a blade of some sort. I don't think I can go on living, I don't think that this was the right job for me. I'm staring down as I write at the street below. I'm going to set my journal down and jump, maybe someone will find it and learn why I did this. Or maybe it will be forgotten forever in an evidence locker. Either way, I tried to prevent the war that is now inevitably going to happen. I wish they hadn't killed her, all for some land. Goodbye... _


End file.
